Not victim. Accomplice. At least that's Jezebel's interpretation of risk management strategy and tactics. It's as if they believe the social climate will always vary within +/-2 degrees. Where in fact the real world operates as a chaotic process with substantially greater variability even in a semi-stable state.

"The training, though extensive," I wrote, "seemed facile. Ultimately, no behavioral code could ward off rape; try as we might to walk in lighted places, our primary offense in the case of an assault would simply, as always, be that of being female."

Unsaid in that is that she is talking about the little brown brothers who they were there to help did not get anti-rape training and that was the Peace Corps fault.

It is truly sad when generic safety advice is attacked. Are the females that read Jezebel totally oblivious to the environment they are in? (I could offer more safety tips like do not wander around the streets of Chicago at night. Would this make me a blame-the-victim guy?)

My 24 year old daughter is coming over from Arizona for Thanksgiving. I'm arranging a gun course for her. Then I'm giving her a gun. She graduated from U of A last year and saw no rapes but I'm not taking chances.

I don't understand how it's the police's fault that her friends all failed to report their rapes. Or is that men's fault generally? Or mine? I really don't understand, but clearly I am at fault somehow.

If someone as alert and knowing as Lena Dunham can be raped than all women are at risk. The trick is not to date nineteen year old Republcans. They're worse than Muslim cab drivers......I didn't even know that there were nineteen year old Republicans on college campi, but that's how sly and tricky the little bastards are.

Rape seems for Jezebel to be an ideology, not a crime. If you are a woman, then you are a rape victim, either past, present, or future. Any advice about avoiding the actual rape is morally equivalent to a rape. Reporting that you've been raped means you've allowed yourself to be co-opted by the rape-system.

Look, I have three granddaughters, the eldest just turned 11. In seven years, she'll be going to college. Before that, she's going to run into horny middle school and high school boys. Her mother and father are going to make sure she's a hard target, and if they need any help, so will her grandfather.

Jezebel is an apt name for this hateful and harmful person. See 1 Kings 21.

In the Sekrit Conspiracy Vault, on the shelf just below the 190-mpg carburetor, sits the unused police procedure which causes rapists to cease to exist. The police will never open the vault and use it until they stop hating women.

Does anyone read Jezebel or is Jezebel an avatar of feminism gone wrong that people read only to rail against? I find it hard to believe that anyone not wrapped in the silliness of the far fringe would be interested in that site.

From the link: "Our tipster, Madison resident Lachrista Greco, wrote in her email, "As a woman who was raped on UW-Madison's campus years ago, I am very glad I never reported, because I now know for sure I would have been blamed."

"She's not, of course, alone in this feeling. Just within the 13-campus University of Wisconsin system, the estimated number of rapes outnumbers the number of sexual assault reports by a margin of 17-1."

If that's really true, this seems like a much more important issue for activists to work on. How are the police supposed to stop rapists they've never heard about? Put it another way: a serial rapist on the UW campus apparently can expect to rape 18 women ON AVERAGE before the police hear anything about it.

Do women at UW care so little for their fellow women? Assume that the ability of the police to catch a rapist is just a function of the number of separate reports about the same rapist -- that a given rapist will be caught when the police get N reports of his crimes (for acquaintance rape, perhaps N=1). Just one additional women brave enough to come forward and brave the cruel policeman silently judging and blaming her would save, on average, 18 other women from being raped.

Whining about how the policemen might silently judge them seems breathtakingly selfish when you think of the 18 women who will be raped because of that one victim's silence.

Much as it pains me to agree with a Jezabel nutcase, a stopped clock is right twice a day. If the job of the police is to tell us how to arrange our affairs so that someone else is victimized, then I don't see why we need police. Their job is to apprehend victimizers, and take them off the street, not conduct seminars in how to make your neighbor's house look more inviting.

garage mahal said..."Tools You Can Use: A Screwdriver: struck into the face of any horned-out, drunk dude that doesn't understand the word no."

I taught self defense for 3 years while attending Washington state university. Screw drivers would be ideal but unlikely to be carried. Keys, pens and pencils on the other hand are commonly carried and just require commitment. The face has a lot of bones in it and eyes are small targets in a fast moving situation for untrained people. Under the jaw or the groin are soft, large and debilitating.

Beyond that ears come off like velcro. Any adult has more than enough strength to peel the cheek off to the attackers ear. Fingers don't bend sideways and again any adult has the strength to break a finger. Don't strike the groin, grab and twist and lift hard. Things will come off.

And always carry a knife. Guns are great until you are in close.

And always know you are going to get hit. Practice getting hit. It is the only way you will be ready.

Left unsaid by Jezebel is that she wants women to be victims. She wants them to act in ways that any rational person knows will result in abuse. Jezebel knows there will always be evil in the world and she wants women to fall prey to it so they can be manipulated more easily.

And the more victims there are they can use them as a bludgeon not against the perpetrators who ironically vote heavily in favor of democrats, but against their political opponents.

Although it makes sense for a perpetrator to vote for people who try to make your victims easier to victimize. Progressivism is.a.sick ideology.

If you're trained in knife-fighting, knives are great. If you aren't, they're actually worse than bare hands -- a stronger person WILL take it away from you, and then you're facing a bigger, stronger guy who (a) is pissed and (b) has a knife.

My roommate and I took a self-defense class in college. At that time the instructor (a cop) told us that the hardest obstacle he had to overcome was women's deep aversion to letting their anger/aggression out with any emotional or physical force in that kind of situation or even in class.

That was not my or my roommate's problem, but it WAS an issue for almost every other female there. Instead of a bellow of rage, you'd get a squeak, not even a scream.

I wonder if Jezebel thinks that women shouldn't have to live in coed dorms or even attend college with men. What about after college? They could live in groups away from men so the women don't have to think about the consequences of their behavior. We could call this living arrangement cloisters, or purdah, or harems, so we can still be multicultural.

Perhaps what was really old is now new. Or perhaps feminism is becoming a utopian ideology for lesbians.

Achilles 2:06. almost word for word applies to blacks too. Crack speaks of blacks charging into the muzzle (he calls it brave, I call it stupid, but blacks have NOTHING to teach whites about charging guns), begging to be shot. Ok, then don't whine when you are!

Now you are guilty of the primary sin of liberals, believing that deep down everybody agrees with your premises, deep down knows you are right, and is arguing dishonestly for some kind of personal gain. Lefties think the right does it for money, righties think the left does it for power.

If you think you were raped, you deal with the issue. You don't ignore it and hope the "justice fairy" comes down and fixes your problems.

I wonder if this woman locks her car. Because, if she was advised to do so, that'd be robbery victim blaming.

From the link: "Our tipster, Madison resident Lachrista Greco, wrote in her email, "As a woman who was raped on UW-Madison's campus years ago, I am very glad I never reported, because I now know for sure I would have been blamed."

"She's not, of course, alone in this feeling. Just within the 13-campus University of Wisconsin system, the estimated number of rapes outnumbers the number of sexual assault reports by a margin of 17-1."

So, left-wing campuses run by extremely left-wing faculty are havens for rape.

Perhaps Progressivism, which is a constant in all of these colleges with such massive problems of rape, is a problem.

It seems to be the one consistent trait.

I'm thinking the only solution they'd support is banning men from public life.

God help them if they ever find themselves at the mercy of one of those unpleasant men who don't buy into their bullshit. Because, as a non-unpleasant man, I see little point in protecting them or breaking up an assault.

BTW, any odds of these women who bitch that police are telling them how to live their lives also favor banning smoking in public, open carry of firearms, etc? Their desire to not have others control their lives is subjective.

You know, I'm just going to come out and say it: if you didn't report your "rape" to the police, I don't want to fuckin' hear about it either.

Indeed. If it's not relevant enough to report to police, it's not relevant enough for me to care about.

That Jezebel article reflects a common type of thinking among "feminists" these days that considers women to be passive, helpless beings who cannot be expected to take charge of their lives. As this thinking goes, there's nothing they can do to protect themselves, nor should they even consider trying to protect themselves, because to do so is to somehow absolve rapists. Although it is fine to tell a man who got mugged walking down a dark alley late at night that perhaps he shouldn't have been there alone, to make an equivalent statement for a woman is forbidden--expecting women to take steps to prevent their own victimhood is somehow "victim blaming".

The problem we're having with many rapes is twofold--rapists pick vulnerable targets, and many rapes go unreported or unprosecuted. For the first issue--vulnerability--there's not a whole lot anyone can do besides the victim, unless we want a police state with constant surveillance and patrols. But people can reduce their chances of becoming a potential victim, say by avoiding getting blackout drunk with people they don't know, or being among trusted friends when they go out. It sucks that anyone should have to alter their behavior due to predators, but it also sucks that you can't walk safely through a bad neighborhood at night. None of this of course absolves the lawbreakers.

As to the second issue, victims need to come forward with their claims more often, and cooperate as much as they can with the police and prosecutors. It's incredibly difficult to convict when the victim won't testify. It's easier said than done, of course, because many victims know the person they're accusing, or even have doubts about what actually happened. But that's the only way more rapes get reported, investigated, and prosecuted.

What would the "feminists" of Jezebel--the ones who think of women as passive pawns--prefer? That this problem be solved with more training of men, teaching them to not rape? The idea that a bona fide rapist is going to sit through a class and suddenly see the light is as absurd as thinking we can get rid of crime by making all people take a class in not committing crimes.

Or perhaps they'd prefer that we remove some of the legal protections for the accused. First, this would do nothing about the unreported cases of rape--you can't get a conviction when no one made the accusation (although perhaps the "feminists" would prefer to just throw random men in jail every year? Because statistically, some of them must have committed rapes, correct?). Second, if we're going to get rid of the presumption of innocence, or right face your accuser in court, or habeus corpus, then why even have a trial?

We're seeing in California what will happen when these nuts get their way. If this doesn't blow up in their face I'll be surprised.

Jezebel belongs to the subset of liberals who don't believe in fighting back, who want to drift through life without being conscious of their surroundings. Trouble is, I think that's most female liberals.

Jezebel is not the target of the UW-Mad Police department fliers. The target audience are the women who are willing to achieve an extra measure of safety at the cost of sending one or two fewer text messages per hour.

And what I think about "the fact that none of the women that [Jezebel] know[s] who have been raped have ever reported it" is that they haven't been raped. An unreported crime is a crime in which the victim has acquiesced.

"Someone should ask Jezebel this: If you have a population of 200 people and

(1) 100 of them walk alone, and 100 of them walk in a group, who is most likely to be the victim of a crime?

(2) 100 of them walk in brightly lit areas, and 100 of them walk in areas that are dimly lit, who is most likely to be the victim of a crime?

(3) 100 of them know exactly where they are going, and the many routes to that destination, and 100 are kind of feeling their way; who is the most likely to be the victim of a crime?

(4) 100 of them are texting as they walk, or earbudded into music, 100 of them are alert to their surroundings; who is the most likely to be the victim of a crime?

(5) 100 are drunk, 100 are sober; who is the most likely to be the victim of a crime?"

I can't speak for Jezebel, as my brain still functions normally, but I would venture to guess that they wouldn't even get to answering your questions because to even ask the question is to victim-blame and support "rape culture".

There are actual "rape cultures" out there--but the dominant culture in the U.S. is certainly not one of them. Rapists are pariahs in a way that no other criminals are. There is no concept of "justifiable rape" as there is with murder. The idea that this culture we live in tolerates rape is ludicrous.

Even the argument over "what is consent" or "does no mean no"-- wherever you stand on those issues, the question is over whether a rape has taken place, not over whether rape is ever okay.

This concept of whether society is doing enough to prosecute rapes has nothing at all to do with whether we are excusing rape--it has everything to do with balancing the rights of the accused with the interests of justice, the same as with every other crime. Rape is of course harder to prosecute than many crimes, as discussed above, but none of this has anything to do with not taking rape seriously.

In fact, the only people not taking rape seriously seem to be the "feminists" who are willing to let more women be rape victims if it means not expecting anyone to take responsibility for avoiding becoming a victim. If there's any "rape culture" that we're living in, it is the culture of treating women as weak pawns so they can be easy prey. It's shameful and disgusting.

If the job of the police is to tell us how to arrange our affairs so that someone else is victimized, then I don't see why we need police.

That would be a sensible argument if this were a zero-sum game. However, in many cases, if there is no easy target available the rapist won't attack a hard target, they will try again the next night. If enough women choose to be hard targets then the number of rapes goes down.

I thought the police suggestions were pretty innocuous. However, if you read between the lines, she is decrying a defensive state of mind that has little to do with the rather mild suggestions. Her interpretation is that no choice is presented but to be a victim or be on perp alert 24/7 because you are female.

Think of the ladies in some Islamic states who are told to cover themselves and stay inside because guys can't help but act like dogs seeing raw meat. We understand that is oppressive and it is the guys that need to learn how to deal.

I was pretty old, about 30, before I realized that many guys actually do walk around unnecessarily assessing the threat posed by guys at work and even random guys on the street for a large part of their day. And they weren't even cops. These were guys that haven't been in a real fight since elementary school.

I was pretty old, about 30, before I realized that many guys actually do walk around unnecessarily assessing the threat posed by guys at work and even random guys on the street for a large part of their day.

It is always unnecessary. Right up to the point that it is necessary.

These were guys that haven't been in a real fight since elementary school.

My daughter had an incident on campus within days of arriving there as an 18 year old freshman. The campus police finally dealt with it when called, all contacts with the university up to "housing director" outside of calling the campus police led to anything from lectures on privilege, suggestions to work it out with the other parties, etc.

The campus police took care of the problem within a half an hour. The rest of them told my daughter to act like a grownup, wanting to fit in, she tried, but when she finally gave up and asked us what a grownup would do, we told her a grownup would call the police. She moderated that advice by calling the campus police, but I guess their advice was good advice after all.

These people have leeched all the meaning out of the word rape. It used to be a dreadful word, back when I thought I knew what it meant. Now you can't tell what it means unless you know every detail of a specific circumstance. Like racism, it's just a whiner's grievance in a contest for political advantage, reserved for the special use of just one class of designated victims who can, themselves, by definition never be opportunistic, predatory or culpable.

Denaturing language like this in an Orwellian effort toward conformity and control is so ugly that to say that the language has been raped is no exaggeration. Victims of the new orthodoxy, on both sides of the gender divide, are piling up. The reckoning may come when the institutions infested with the clerics of this orthodoxy falter and fail. Competition will eventually clear the mess out, I expect.

You are responsible for your safety, I am responsible for mine. If you are conflating terrorists with "aliens and Orcs," you are not really fit for the job of looking after my safety. If you are running for any office that involves public safety, I would deeply appreciate your making this equivalency of terrorists with orcs and aliens part of your platform publicly.

@SOJO, we guys learn to assess our surroundings without consciously thinking of it, in much the same way that defensive driving means continuously being alert to what the other cars on the road are doing without thinking about it.

At least the ones of us who don't want to be mugged.

As Ignorance is Bliss wrote, it's always unnecessary, right up to the point where it isn't. Sort of like the fire extinguisher we keep in the kitchen.

I think that goes too far. Jezebel want women to remain weak and complaining so that they continue to read Jezebel for (phony, but invisibly so to the usual readers) reasons why they are weak and complaining.

Can someone attacking Jezebel explain how safety tips are related to "shedding a persona?" If the Police Department had titled the article: "Don't be a Victim: Staying Safe on Campus," it would have been fine. A person writing headlines should understand what words like "persona" mean.

I agree with most here: It is not victim-blaming to give women advice on being a harder target, and it's not because we don't want to tell the criminals that what they're doing is wrong. My little girl will be the hardest target I can make her, and that's not because I take an easygoing attitude toward would-be assailants.

But I have to take issue with this:

"if you didn't report your 'rape' to the police, I don't want to fuckin' hear about it either."

Before I knew her, a friend was raped. I'm not talking about some murky grey area of did-she-consent-or-didn't-she; I'm talking sudden knife to the throat, absolute surprise, submit or I'll kill you.

She didn't report. And sometimes I've wondered, Did he go on to victimize someone else? If so, could reporting have stopped him? But I don't wonder hard enough to ask her that.

Rape can be awfully tough to prove beyond reasonable doubt. I don't know if she could have, and I don't have it in me to blame her for feeling too defeated to try.

"Rape can be awfully tough to prove beyond reasonable doubt. I don't know if she could have, and I don't have it in me to blame her for feeling too defeated to try."

That's true, it can be especially hard for a victim of a trauma to want to even think about what happened let alone report. This, as well as the fact that in many cases of rape the victim knew the accuser, likely is the reason so many rapes do go unreported.

But it's not really "blaming" the victim to say that more reporting is necessary. If we're going to see justice done, and more importantly, prevent further rapes by the perpetrators (who rarely rape only once), victims are going to need to report and cooperate on these cases.

"But it's not really 'blaming' the victim to say that more reporting is necessary. If we're going to see justice done...victims are going to need to report and cooperate on these cases."

Oh, agreed, no question. Which is one thing that annoys me about that Jezebel aside: the idea that if the cops don't show the exact level of sensitivity the writer demands, and express themselves according to her exact script, it's their fault her acquaintances don't report.

Fen: "What if she found out she was raped because the perp's previous victim also decided to not report?"

Yep - but I'm filing that under, Thoughts I will keep firmly to myself.

I'm not making a moral case for not reporting. I'm saying I understand it, even as I believe that reporting is the right thing to do.

Writ Small said...In defense of the Jezebel article, that headline is awful.

Can someone attacking Jezebel explain how safety tips are related to "shedding a persona?" If the Police Department had titled the article: "Don't be a Victim: Staying Safe on Campus," it would have been fine. A person writing headlines should understand what words like "persona" mean.

per·so·na noun \pər-ˈsō-nə, -ˌnä\: the way you behave, talk, etc., with other people that causes them to see you as a particular kind of person : the image or personality that a person presents to other people.

The headline appears to use the term correctly; Jezebel incorrectly adds intentionality to the definition, thus making the headline sound more victim-blame-y than it was.

I was pretty old, about 30, before I realized that many guys actually do walk around unnecessarily assessing the threat posed by guys at work and even random guys on the street for a large part of their day."

Two points:

1. Absolutely. And more often than not, I choose to remove myself from situations where some kind of confrontation may occur. I'm not afraid to "drop the gloves" and I carry every day. But assessing threats and removing yourself from situations is better than finding yourself in confrontation.

2. I think that every person on the planet assesses the people around them and calculates who is a threat and who isn't. I think that's hardwired into our dna. You may not know you're doing it, but you are.

Jupiter said...Their job is to apprehend victimizers, and take them off the street, not conduct seminars in how to make your neighbor's house look more inviting.

Hey Jupiter, back to the Jezebel article, how the fuck are the police supposed to apprehend victimizers if the victims don't report the crime? It's fine to say that's the cops' job, but if no one reports a crime what sense does it make to then blame the cop for not catching the criminal? Doesn't really seem logical in any way to me, but I'm a guy so that's probably just my male privilege talking. What do you want to bet if the campus cops weren't doing this kind of outreach they'd be blamed for being too remote and not engaged with the community, maybe even sexist for not addressing the epidemic of sexual assault on campus?

"I'm not making a moral case for not reporting. I'm saying I understand it, even as I believe that reporting is the right thing to do."

I agree with that--it's necessary for victims to report, but it's understandable that many will not want to. As someone who's never been raped, I won't imply that it's easy to deal with or that a victim should be harshly criticized for how they try to do so.

Can someone attacking Jezebel explain how safety tips are related to "shedding a persona?"

A persona would be like a feminist making up rape threats so that people will give her the attention and sympathy normally reserved for real victims.

Playing the "I was molested!" card gives feminsists cred. Its a fad. And some women are putting themselves in irrational circumstances to be "famous". Detaching yourself from how the world really works may play in the classrooms. Not so much on the streets.

Short version - don't telegraph weakness under the misconception that everyone is too civilized to take advantage of you. The predators are very adept at identifying the weak, and they never heard of Amanda Marcotte.

Rape can be awfully tough to prove beyond reasonable doubt. I don't know if she could have, and I don't have it in me to blame her for feeling too defeated to try.

Proving innocence in those cases is not any easier. Hell, several Duke professors STILL think that the lacrosse team raped that stripper when there was basically zero evidence that anything she claimed was true.

In practice, well.... Like JPS, I would ask myself Why didn't you report!? But I wouldn't ask any friend that question (Unless they, say, trot out the experience in a Jezebel posting). If they asked my opinion, I'd give it (What if he or she rapes again? What if the person before you had reported the rape?). But there are times when friends just listen and try to support.

MadisonMain said...But there are times when friends just listen and try to support.

I 100% agree and given the circumstances I wouldn't necessarily blame someone for not reporting such a crime, HOWEVER I would not allow them to then blame the police for failing to prevent the criminal from committing subsequent crimes. This is the tone adopted by the article, "no wonder we don't report crimes, what with you stupid cops blaming/shaming the victim/potential victim, you police need to do a better job of preventing the crime in the first place." So it's the cops fault for not catching the criminal and preventing crime and it's also the cops fault that victims don't take basic steps (reporting the crime) that would make catching the criminal and preventing crime possible, as Jezebel sees it. That doesn't work.

"I 100% agree and given the circumstances I wouldn't necessarily blame someone for not reporting such a crime, HOWEVER I would not allow them to then blame the police for failing to prevent the criminal from committing subsequent crimes. This is the tone adopted by the article, "no wonder we don't report crimes, what with you stupid cops blaming/shaming the victim/potential victim, you police need to do a better job of preventing the crime in the first place." So it's the cops fault for not catching the criminal and preventing crime and it's also the cops fault that victims don't take basic steps (reporting the crime) that would make catching the criminal and preventing crime possible, as Jezebel sees it. That doesn't work."

I think the point they're trying to make is that the reason the crimes are going unreported is because the cops get all judgmental, blaming the victim, giving them harsh questioning that implies the victim is lying, and ultimately discouraging the victim from going through with the report and prosecution.

However, it really can't be avoided--if you're going to prosecute, the defense has a right to question your story, try to make you look like a liar, and in some cases question your character. The police and prosecution have every reason to prepare victims for this so there won't be any surprises later. Maybe they can provide additional support so the victim can go through it without backing out, but the fact is there's no way to avoid the unpleasantness so long as we protect the rights of the accused.

Oh, nonsense. I carry a knife too, but any tactical/defensive handgun course will deal with this scenario. It's not rocket science.

SOJO,

A friend of mine is a civilian contract who teaches unarmed combat at JBLM (formerly Ft. Lewis.) He also volunteers at the local Y by helping out with one of their karate classes, and occasionally recruits some of his buddies to help out with that class.

I went once and got paired up with a 95-pound petite woman as my sparring partner. OMG. There was nothing I could to to make her hit me with a force that felt stronger than a lobbed nerf ball. Maybe if I'd known the right phrase to say that would have really pissed her off*... but then again that seems a little over-the-top for a Y class.

--------------------------* I do know what Charles Rodman Campbell did to his victims, but yeah it would be way out of line to suggest that at a Y class just to get my partner actually using her d*mn muscles.

I think the point they're trying to make is that the reason the crimes are going unreported is because the cops get all judgmental, blaming the victim, giving them harsh questioning that implies the victim is lying, and ultimately discouraging the victim from going through with the report and prosecution.

...perhaps they should criticize the numerous women who DO lie about it.

"The military calls it 'keeping your head on a swivel' and it's probably the most important thing you can do to ensure your safety. If you present yourself as easy prey, then expect to attract some wolves.

We also call it "maintaining situational awareness" and, while it cannot prevent all bad things, it certainly reduces the chance you'll enter a dangerous situation fat, dumb, and happy. Attracting those wolves mentioned. That Jezebel author seems intent on being unreasonable.

I once visited a city I had lived in but hadn't seen in some time. I met some friends at a restaurant we all had known back in the day, near a mall, but close to a now sadly rundown neighborhood. It was dark as we exited the restaurant and said our goodbyes. Entering my car, I noticed two young men who seemed to be giving me the eye. As I left the parking lot, they got into a beat up car and pulled into traffic behind me.

No big deal, but the car was missing the front license plate, and they began to take every turn I made across town toward my hotel. They pulled in behind me at every turn and light for over five miles. And their attention seemed to be on me, rather than each other or the traffic. When I reached the hotel, I stopped in front of the well-lit lobby, rather than parking in the lot. They turned into the lot, drove past me, then returned to the street and left.